Food, Fun, Education and Friends - WCR
I'm back to work! Have been having a great vacation and will try to do some vacation posts, but now it's time to work. For now that means attending the WCR (Women Chefs and Restaurateurs) conference in Cambridge MA. It's tough but I have to keep learning new things!
Yesterday morning was tour day. A group of 15 of us taxied to Boston's North End to take a guided tour of the Italian section. We started at a pastry shop where we learned about the different pastries, different regions of Italy and what ingredients are used in the various areas. Have I mentioned recently that I love my job?
After all of the wonderful things we learned, we had to snack to keep up our energy. The people at Maria's put together a tray of almost one of everything in the shop and we sampled.
Next on to other stops. We stopped at a greengrocer. We did not go inside because it was too tiny for a group of 15. Our tour guide brought out some vegetables, talked about them and then of course we snacked on prickley pear, persimmon and fennel. Need to keep up our energy.
We moved on to a seafood shop were we tasted a fresh, seasonal, raw Nantucket scallop. Delicious! We went to a coffee shop, again very tiny, filled to the brim and bursting with coffees, dried beans, roasted chickpeas, herbs, coffee pots. Yes we did taste - chickpeas, pine nuts, licorice roots, almond candy.
We moved on to a cheese shop that also had proscuitto, bread, sandwiches and prepared foods. The 15 of us barely fit inside. It was cozy. We sampled some proscuitto and cheese.
We visited a shop where we learned a lot about olive oil, balsamic vinegar and tasted them too. We moved on to a wine and spirit shop where we learned a lot about before dinner drinks, during dinner drinks and after dinner drinks. Very interesting. We had a taste of limoncello which was delicious and pretty powerful. The tour ended and we went to a restaurant for lunch.
In our defense, we had been walking for 3 hours and the the samples were tiny. I had gnocchi with Italian sausage sauce with some sauteed spinach. Greens are good for you. Once refreshed we headed back to all the stores to do some shopping. I'm not sure if it's good or bad that I have a car and can fit many purchases.
Once back at the hotel I took a tiny nap, maybe 15 minutes and headed to the opening reception. I'm here to work after all and had to get some networking in and catch up with friends I see only once a year.
There was food. And wine. I was pretty full so had just a morsel of appetizers to be polite and one glass of wine. And lots of Pellegrino, I was pretty thirsty after this full day of working.
All at the top of the hotel looking over the Charles River.
This may be a surprise, but I did not go out to dinner last night. I had a great lunch and picked up some proscuitto, cheese, roasted red peppers and Italian rolls for dinner. A picnic at the hotel. Perfect ending to the day.
Now it's on the the second day of conference. I need to get to breakfast, general session and then some classes. Should be a great day!
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